Weather News

Thunderstorms light up the Kimberley sky

A low over northern areas of Western Australia's Kimberley region is generating plenty of thunderstorms and areas of heavy rain over an already saturated landscape.

It's been an exceptionally wet last few months for coastal and adjacent inland parts of the Kimberley, with some places receiving their highest February rain totals in decades. For some other places, such as Halls Creek, it has been relatively dry, in fact the airport at Halls Creek has not registered a drop this month.

There has been plenty of tropical low and cyclone action bringing heavy rain and thunderstorms to most of the Kimberley, and another low is currently firing up over the area's north. The latest batch of thunderstorms kicked off over the far north around 11pm last night WST, and by 2pm today, over 56,000 lightning strikes were detected in a 200km radius of Kalumburu. Of these, over 6000 strikes were cloud-to-ground strikes.

The low hasn't produced massive amounts of widespread rain as yet, although some places like Truscott and Kalumburu have had some healthy falls today. More heavy rain within thunderstorms is likely on Sunday, staying around the northern Kimberley, with falls of well over 80mm possible in some areas.

On Monday, the low should move southwest bringing more heavy rain to other already soaked parts of the Kimberley. Fortunately, this system is showing no signs as yet of being a potential cyclone, however it will bring plenty of rain as the wet season keeps on keeping on.